Friday, June 20, 2014

But, but, but... Janet Yellen didn't say precious metal valuations were within historical norms? Gold and Silver are surging today (and have done since the FOMC press conference all-clear) with the latter having its best day in months and back at 3-month highs... Intriguingly, just as we warned, gold and silver have been on a significant tear since the Qingdao CCFD probe began (as synthetic hedges are unwound - which dominate pricing in PMs) while copper and iron ore and so on have all fallen (as the reality of no real demand leaks into these commodities).

Is the CCFD unwind having its impact?

As we commented previously:

When we previously contemplated what the end of funding deals (which the PBOC and the China Politburo seems rather set on) may mean for the price of other commodities, we agreed with Goldman that it would be certainly negative. And yet in the case of gold, it just may be that even if China were to dump its physical to some willing 3rd party buyer, its inevitable cover of futures "hedges", i.e. buying gold in the paper market, may not only offset the physical selling, but send the price of gold back to levels seen at the end of 2012 when gold CCFDs really took off in earnest.

In other words, from a purely mechanistical standpoint, the unwind of China's shadow banking system, while negative for all non-precious metals-based commodities, may be just the gift that all those patient gold (and silver) investors have been waiting for. This of course, excludes the impact of what the bursting of the Chinese credit bubble would do to faith in the globalized, debt-driven status quo. Add that into the picture, and into the future demand for gold, and suddenly things get really exciting.

In the gold markets, the paper or synthetic 'demand/supply' dominates pricing as opposed to the non-precious metals which have at least a grain of fundamental sense to them still

Throughout 2012/2013 - as the gold CFDs were booming, Chinese demand for physical gold was soaring as the price plunged (due to the forward hedging required in the CFD transactions which pressured gold swaps/futures lower and thus dominated pricing)

As CFD unwinds hit en masse, these flows must unwind (cover hedges and ensure the underlying physical is there... and if not buy it)

This will pressure gold futures prices higher and because unlike in non-precious commodities where spot markets wag the tail of the futures markets - spot gold will likely be dragged higher also (as we know the demand for the physical has been high).

So unlike in the industrial commodities - where the CCFD unwind drives prices down as the image above shows, thanks to synthetic manipulation and domination of the paper gold (and silver) market, the opposite occurs in PMs.